图片摄于2006年吴曹颖(音)在父亲的陪伴下学习英文 原图来自纽约时报

　　美国《纽约时报》2月16日文章，原题：在中国，所有赌注都押在家中的大学生身上 在这一生中，吴叶兵(音)几乎每个工作日都下矿井，在幽闭坑道内令人窒息的煤尘中挥舞电钻，每月能挣500美元的吴只有一个目标：供女儿上学。每年5月至7月，他妻子曹薇萍(音)天天在苹果园里从早忙到晚，其他时间则到商店打工，所有的钱都被用于女儿的教育。

　　许多西方家庭也为子女教育煞费苦心，为其积攒大学学费。但与数百万含辛茹苦供孩子上学的中国低收入父母所承受的重负相比，那些付出算不上什么。

　　在中国西部小村长大的吴和曹节省了一辈子。近20年来，他们一直住在狭小透风的旧房里，为省路费和礼品钱并有机会挣加班费，已连续5年没回老家过年。由于他们的艰辛付出，女儿吴曹颖(音)已成为大二学生。同越来越多的中国大学生一样，她的受教育程度已远超父母曾经的奢望。但父母的辛劳未必能获得回报。大学文凭已不能确保高收入工作，因为过去10年来中国的大学毕业生人数已翻两番。

　　每年花费父母所有收入一半以上的校园生活令吴左右为难，她正考虑辍学并找份工作。“女儿每次打电话都说不想上学了”，曹薇萍说，“我说‘为了给我们养老，你必须继续学习。’她说‘这样压力太大，我不想再考虑这些责任。’”

　　对中国的农村父母而言，每年的大学费用相当于6至15个月的劳作收入。美国私立大学每年的平均费用与其人均年收入基本相当，州立大学费用仅为前者的一半，且美国学生普遍比中国学生更容易获得助学金。中国父母的负担并不仅限于大学，还面临与小学、初高中有关的诸多费用。许多人为提高子女成绩还请家教。与美国父母相比，一旦子女毕业后找不到工作，将所有积蓄都倾注于孩子教育的中国父母将几乎没什么退路。

　　吴一家的经历是一扇窗，既见证了中国与日俱增的教育机遇，也凸显中国家庭承受的经济负担。父母倾其所有供儿女读书也说明，最近10年在培养大学生方面中国为何令美国望尘莫及。但伴随教育成本居高不下的是中国经济增长放缓，以及近期大学毕业生失业率激增。像吴这样的年轻人毕业后能否找到工作养活自己遑论为父母排忧解难，将考验中国未来数年内维持经济快速增长并保持政治和社会稳定的能力。(作者基斯布拉德舍，王会聪译)

　　纽约时报原文：

　　HANJING, China — Wu Yiebing has been going down coal shafts practically every workday of his life, wrestling an electric drill for $500 a month in the choking dust of claustrophobic tunnels, with one goal in mind: paying for his daughter’s education。

　　The Education Revolution

　　Articles in this series are examining the promises and challenges that China faces as it tries to educate its citizens more broadly。

　　His wife, Cao Weiping, toils from dawn to sunset in orchards every day during apple season in May and June. She earns $12 a day tying little plastic bags one at a time around 3,000 young apples on trees, to protect them from insects. The rest of the year she works as a substitute store clerk, earning several dollars a day, all going toward their daughter’s education。

　　Many families in the West sacrifice to put their children through school, saving for college educations that they hope will lead to a better life. Few efforts can compare with the heavy financial burden that millions of lower-income Chinese parents now endure as they push their children to obtain as much education as possible。

　　Yet a college degree no longer ensures a well-paying job, because the number of graduates in China has quadrupled in the last decade。

　　Mr. Wu and Mrs. Cao, who grew up in tiny villages in western China and became migrants in search of better-paying work, have scrimped their entire lives. For nearly two decades, they have lived in a cramped and drafty 200-square-foot house with a thatch roof. They have never owned a car. They do not take vacations — they have never seen the ocean. They have skipped traditional New Year trips to their ancestral village for up to five straight years to save on bus fares and gifts, and for Mr. Wu to earn extra holiday pay in the mines. Despite their frugality, they have essentially no retirement savings。

　　Thanks to these sacrifices, their daughter, Wu Caoying, is now a 19-year-old college sophomore. She is among the growing millions of Chinese college students who have gone much farther than their parents could have dreamed when they were growing up. For all the hard work of Ms. Wu’s father and mother, however, they aren’t certain it will pay off. Their daughter is ambivalent about staying in school, where the tuition, room and board cost more than half her parents’ combined annual income. A slightly above-average student, she thinks of dropping out, finding a job and earning money。

　　“Every time my daughter calls home, she says, ‘I don’t want to continue this,’ ” Mrs. Cao said. “And I say, ‘You’ve got to keep studying to take care of us when we get old’, and she says, ‘That’s too much pressure, I don’t want to think about all that responsibility.’ ”

　　Ms. Wu dreams of working at a big company, but knows that many graduates end up jobless. “I think I may start my own small company,” she says, while acknowledging she doesn’t have the money or experience to run one。

　　For a rural parent in China, each year of higher education costs six to 15 months’ labor, and it is hard for children from poor families to get scholarships or other government financial support. A year at the average private university in the United States similarly equals almost a year’s income for the average wage earner, while an in-state public university costs about six months’ pay, but financial aid is generally easier to obtain than in China. Moreover, an American family that spends half its income helping a child through college has more spending power with the other half of its income than a rural Chinese family earning less than $5,000 a year。

　　It isn’t just the cost of college that burdens Chinese parents. They face many fees associated with sending their children to elementary, middle and high schools. Many parents also hire tutors, so their children can score high enough on entrance exams to get into college. American families that invest heavily in their children’s educations can fall back on Medicare,

　　Social Security and other social programs in their old age. Chinese citizens who bet all of their savings on their children’s educations have far fewer options if their offspring are unable to find a job on graduation。

　　The experiences of Wu Caoying, whose family The New York Times has tracked for seven years, are a window into the expanding educational opportunities and the financial obstacles faced by families all over China。

　　Her parents’ sacrifices to educate their daughter explain how the country has managed to leap far ahead of the United States in producing college graduates over the last decade, with eight million Chinese now getting degrees annually from universities and community colleges。

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